Washington Talk; Assessing Clinton's Aspirations, Again

By DAVID STOUT

Published: May 30, 2003

WASHINGTON, May 29—
The man once taught law, and he has personal experience with the workings of the Constitution, so perhaps his views deserve attention. He said it would be good if former presidents could return to the White House, even if they had already served two terms.

''For future generations, the 22nd Amendment should be modified,'' he said on Wednesday in a conversation with the historian Michael Beschloss at the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum in Boston. The man, William Jefferson Clinton, said he was not thinking about himself, of course.

Sure he was, the historian Douglas Brinkley of the University of New Orleans said today. The 22nd Amendment, enacted after Franklin D. Roosevelt became the only president elected to more than two terms, ''has to drive someone like Bill Clinton crazy,'' Professor Brinkley said with a chuckle.

Professor Brinkley said Mr. Clinton is not just a physically fit man of 56 who has been put out to pasture. He is in withdrawal from ''the ultimate power palace'' of the White House who yearns to make up for his failures, and not just by party fund-raising or Jimmy Carter-style good deeds with hammer and saw.

Consider Andrew Johnson, the only other president to be impeached. Professor Brinkley noted that, after barely surviving his Senate trial and finishing Abraham Lincoln's second term under a cloud, Johnson went home to Tennessee, where he achieved a comeback as the only former president ever elected to the Senate.

But that path would seem closed for Bill Clinton. One of the senators from his new home state of New York is Hillary Rodham Clinton. The Clintons have had their troubles, but they may not want to campaign against each other. And it might be a stretch to ask New York voters to elect Clintons to both Senate seats.

''There may come a time when we have elected a president at age 45 or 50, and then 20 years later the country comes up with the same sort of problems the president faced before,'' Mr. Clinton said. ''And the people would like to bring that man or woman back.'' He said he was not proposing that a president be elected to three or more consecutive terms, but that he be able to get elected again after an interim.

They can't because of the 22nd Amendment, which took effect in 1951 and bars a person from being elected president more than twice. And despite Mr. Clinton's remarks, or because of them, there will be no rush to change it, historians said today.

''It will seem self-serving if there's an ex-president sitting around who might be affected,'' said Allan J. Lichtman, a history professor and presidential scholar at American University in Washington.

Professor Lichtman said that enacting a constitutional amendment, through a two-thirds vote of both Houses of Congress and ratification by three-quarters of the state legislatures, often takes several years. A colleague, James A. Thurber, said, ''It would take a very popular president in his second term, like Reagan'' to stir real momentum for a constitutional change. Professor Thurber is director of American University's Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies.

Historians sometimes invoke images of the frail, cloak-wrapped Franklin Roosevelt shortly before his death in 1945 as an argument that a president should not serve more than two terms.

But the authors of the 22nd Amendment had pure politics as well as history in mind. In 1947, with new majorities in both houses and smarting from their years out of power, Republicans pushed the amendment through Congress. The measure took four years to gather the necessary support among the states.

Given the bitter partisanship in today's politics, Professor Lichtman, who is 56, said, ''I do not expect to see another constitutional amendment in my lifetime.''

Professor Brinkley also had a prediction: ''The only way you'll ever see Bill Clinton in the White House again is in the role of First Man.''

Photo: Former President Bill Clinton at a forum on Wednesday in Boston. (Associated Press)